Sandpoint Waldorf School campus closing effective 3.16.2020

Dear SWS Community, 
 
As the number of cases of COVID-19 begins to increase dramatically and with positive cases in our state, our school has made the difficult decision to move to remote learning, which we are calling Outside the Box. Starting Monday, March 16th, we will close our campus.  This decision was not made lightly; it was through a great many conversations among trustees, faculty, administration and our medical advisory task force. 
 
Although our own students are not at high risk coming to school, social distancing is imperative to protect the more vulnerable members of our wider community. 
 
The faculty will be participating in three days of in-service March 16 - 18 to meet, plan and prepare for the work to continue over the coming weeks so that our students can keep up with the year’s curriculum or families can be supported at the early childhood level with structure, rhythm and program. As part of their planning, the faculty will need to know what your family’s technical capabilities are. Please complete the tech survey if you have not done so, so that we can support your family in accessing the information and materials.  
 
We will begin offering our program remotely on Thursday, March 19th for all ages, and expect all students to participate fully. To mitigate the numbers of people in our school, we will be open Monday and Tuesday 12-3 for you to pick up student materials and belongings. Curriculum content will be available on Thursday, and if you need to make a single trip, you can pick up your child’s belongings as well as curriculum at that time. Parent-teacher conferences will take place over the phone at the pre-arranged times this week. Please note that this is an evolving situation and we will update you as soon as possible if our plan needs to change. Thank you for being flexible as we navigate these rapidly changing circumstances. 
 
Through March 27, we will run the Outside the Box distance learning programs for all students. We will observe Spring Break as planned from March 30 – April 10. We will reassess the situation as time progresses and hope to resume on-site learning as soon as we can. 
 
One of the most stressful aspects of this situation is the unknown. Whether to remain open or closed, how COVID-19 is transmitted, how to contain the spread, when we will be able to return to life as normal. We cannot give you a date when we will come together again. That is unsettling for us, and we can only imagine how it might feel for our children.  Continuing to nurture our sense of community, which is one of the core values of the Sandpoint Waldorf School, will guide us and help us to meet this challenge with courage and grace.  
 
Right now, the entire world is taking a step back – slowing down and reducing activities – for the sake of those who would be most affected by COVID-19. This is a beautiful act of selflessness that we too will embrace. We recognize the hardship this creates for all of us; this comes at a tremendous cost, inconvenience, and financial expense for the world. We are intending to navigate this time with renewed strength and a greater empathy for the beautiful world in which we live. 
 
The verse below from Rudolf Steiner is the verse that the board and the faculty speak at the start of their meetings.  May it help all of us navigate this time with courage, empathy, and strength. 
 
We will update the SWS community as we develop plans in the coming days.  
 
Warmly,
SWS Administration 
 
A Verse for Our Time
 
We must eradicate from the soul
All fear and terror of what comes towards man out of the future.
We must acquire serenity
In all feelings and sensations about the future.
WE must look forward with absolute equanimity
To everything that may come.
And we must think only that whatever comes
IS given to us by a world-directive full of wisdom.
It is part of what we must learn in this age,
Namely, to live out of pure trust,
Without any security in existence.
Trusting in the ever present help
Of the spiritual world. 
Truly, nothing else will do
If your courage is not to fail us.
And let us seek the awakening from within ourselves
Every morning and every evening.
 
-Rudolf Steiner

How to talk to your Child about Current Events...

How to talk to your Child about Current Events? 
The third grade parent meeting discussed this question in a recent parent meeting. Below is an excerpt from Clare Stansberry's class email.

A major question that was asked our recent parent meeting, and that some of you may have experienced, was "how do we handle current events?" It's such a rich question, and it is one that the children are asking as well. They want to know the world better, and are bound to encounter some of the darker edges of the world. 

Baseline to this question: proceed with caution. We want to be exceedingly careful in how we expose children to current events, and erring on the side of overprotective at this age is reasonable. 

I think there are two major considerations for exposing children to some of these things. First, we must consider their ability to comprehend the event. The children's world is still mostly in the realm of the family unit. If they have family (who they know well) in faraway places, their sense of the world is that we have family here and there. Distance, time, and space are all still abstract for the children, so we must be careful in how we expose them to things. In their minds, Seattle and Switzerland may be equally distant. When they hear about things that are far away, those things can feel very close to home. Relating things far away to events close to home can help ground the children in reality. I would use this strategy when children hear about things incidentally, and come home asking about distant events. Acknowledging and then changing the subject can also help to assuage their curiosity. 

The second consideration is whether their knowledge of this event causes them fear or anxiety. Children in the 9th year still tend toward the view that the world is good, and we want to foster their interest in the world without causing undue fear. Teaching children to be worried about cars is one thing; teaching them to be worried about political events around the world is quite another. We want their worries to be in proportion to their lives and immediately actionable. By this, I mean that we want them to be able to do something in the community when they feel anxious. If they are wondering about people going hungry, let them pick out a can of food each time you go to the store to donate to the food bank. If they are worried about wildlife, look for ways to care for the flora and fauna in your neighborhood. Find ways that work for you and your family to transform these fears about the world into action. We want the children  to form a direct relationship with the world, and not shy away from it because they are afraid. 

 If you are finding that your child is asking questions about current events, or hears about them from siblings or friends, turn first to your child and check in with them. Connect with them about their own lives and their concerns. Part of gaining orientation in the world is learning to appreciate your own perspective. When we take the children's thoughts and feelings seriously, they get the benefit of connecting with and feeling affirmed by the love of those around them. The broader world has many difficult situations in it, and what we want first is that the children take an interest world despite its challenges. By giving them some protection and loving guidance, we keep their rich, imaginative, sensitive selves open to new experiences. 

Submitted by Clare Stansberry, Grade 3 Teacher

Children That Play Outside in All Weather Grow Up Resilient

Published January 10th, 2014
By Andrew McMartin, Executive Director at the p.i.n.e. project in Toronto, ON

It seems like an obvious statement, so why don’t kids play outside in challenging weather nearly as much as they used to? Why are schools keeping kids inside at recess when the temperature gets too cold? What kind of adult will this type of childhood experience create?

Most challenges, risks, and hurdles are swiftly removed from childhood in efforts to prevent anything bad from happening to the children that we love.

As Winter ebbs and flows, with temperatures ranging from minus 25 to plus 10 in the past few weeks, we’ve experienced a wonderful range of opportunities with the programs we run. Challenges and opportunities. From freezing weather with blustery winds, to rain and floods in the parks where we work, to massive snowstorms full of amazing forts and fun!

Imagine children that have grown up playing outside in all manner of challenging conditions, in all seasons of the year. Imagine how they’d be different than kids taught to come inside when it’s raining, or cold. Imagine how they’d be different from kids that find entertainment from the TV, computer or video games.

Kids who play outside in challenging weather are more positive, more creative, and more adaptable. They don’t let challenges stop them. They rise to challenges and find ways to carry on in spite of them. And that’s just their baseline. It’s nothing special to them. It’s normal.

It used to be normal for all kids.

Add mentors and role models with smiles on their faces, skills to keep everyone warm and happy(ish), challenging questions to keep children growing and children become even more incredible! Especially if parents, family, and community are all making these types of experiences a normal reality for their children, rather than preventing them from going outside in all weather.

Imagine children that have grown up playing outside in all manner of challenging conditions, in all seasons of the year. Imagine how they’d be different than kids taught to come inside when it’s raining, or cold.

Challenging weather creates real and perceived risks, and so risk creates opportunity for growth. Because risks teach. They have real consequences that ask us to be aware; aware of ourselves, others, and nature.

This type of risk is a rare opportunity for children today. Most challenges, risks, and hurdles are swiftly removed from childhood in efforts to prevent anything bad from happening to the kids we love. But this may be robbing children of life’s challenges and not preparing them for the realities of being an adult.

Kids don’t have to be positive, creative, or adaptable if there are no challenges. With no challenges, there are no consequences. What kind of adult will result from a childhood without challenges or consequences? Yikes is all I have to say.

The great thing is, it’s easy to switch this up.

One way is to just go outside. Go out in all conditions, and if you aren’t comfortable doing so, bring your kids to others that are. That’s community, and a “village raising a child”, so to speak.

Amazing things happen outside.

In one day of our programs last week, our day (five different programs for ages 4-10) included:

• Watching a Barrel Owl hunting small mammals in a meadow

• Making herbal teas from natural ingredients found locally

• Finding and exploring a Deer kill site, and the tracks of Coyotes, and various scavengers

• Finding and exploring a Muskrat kill site, and wondering who might have been the predator

• Giving thanks and gratitude for all the lessons nature provides

• Smoking a deer hide to make soft leather for projects

• Making pine pitch to glue an ax head on to a handle

• Finding an Owl or possibly a Hawk pellet and dissecting it to find clues

• Finding a birds nest and investigating whose nest it was

• Playing tons of games

• Eating snack and lunch outside

• Tracking and acting like animals to understand them better, and the lessons they teach us

• So much more I can’t fit it all in here…

So go outside. And keep going out there, no matter the weather. And keep sending your kids out there, or to us regardless of what may be happening out there. (Remember, children grow up healthy all over the world. In arctic conditions, in deserts, and in the tropics. -50C to plus 45C, and they do just fine).

Don’t let fears get in the way.

Get out there, explore, and see what you find. Sit still for long periods of time and take a break from the schedule and routine of a busy life.

Ask questions and search for answers, but don’t worry if you don’t find them!!! Just be as curious as little kids!

Go out in all weather, dress for it well, and make this a normal thing for yourself, and for children growing up. They’ll grow up resilient, adaptable, creative, positive and aware, things they’ll need to face their future in a good way.

Educating the Whole Child

What exactly does it mean to be intelligent?   Often it means something along the lines of smart, intellectually agile, or having earned high marks on tests in school.   Historically, education seemed to identify “reading, writing, and arithmetic” as the core aspects of learning, often loosely categorizing learners as tending to either be strong in math/sciences or in humanities.  

But human beings are much more richly nuanced than this.   In 1983, Dr.  Howard Gardner (a 1971 Harvard graduate, Harvard professor of education, speaker, and author) published the controversial book Frames of Mind:  The Theory of Multiple Intelligences in which he challenged the long-accepted paradigm of two “tracks” of students:  those inclined towards mathematics, and those strong in language.   Instead, in his original publication Gardner identified seven types of intelligence, and through his subsequent work identified an additional two realms of intelligence for a total of nine:  bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, verbal-linguistic, logical-mathematical, naturalistic, intrapersonal, musical, visual-spatial, and existential.

Another perspective of intelligence comes from author, psychologist, and science journalist Dr.  Daniel Goleman.  Goleman’s internationally best-selling 1995 the book entitled Emotional Intelligence develops the argument that a person’s Intelligence Quotient, or IQ, in actuality does not reliably indicate future life success.   Instead, Goleman asserts that IQ contributes at best twenty percent to the factors that determine life success, leaving eighty percent or more to “other conditions”.  Goleman expounds upon an idea he calls “Emotional Intelligence” or  “EQ” - the ability, capacity, or skill to identify, assess, and manage the emotions of one’s self, of others, and of groups.  Referring to numerous studies that support his assertions, this type of intelligence, he explains, is the factor that allows an individual of “average” IQ to experience higher-than-average success in personal relationships, in school, in the workplace, and in the community.

Gardner and Goleman’s work, while independent of one another, is complementary in some regards.   Each body of work maintains that the human being is a more complex organism than was once believed, and consequently carries implications for what it means to be human, to work cooperatively, to communicate, or to educate.  In fact, both of these bodies of work have generated recent efforts and approaches in mainstream education in the form of “differentiated learning” and/or special classes intended to develop the “whole child,” thereby strengthening students’ emotional intelligence.

For one hundred years, Waldorf schools developed on Steiner’s insights have aimed to educate the thinking, feeling, and willing realms of the developing child, often described as an education “from the inside out.”   Long before Gardner or Goleman appeared on the education scene, Waldorf schools were fostering a wide variety of students’ individual capacities (capacities that Gardner later identified as the individual spheres of intelligence), as well as being together in a close-knit learning community that allows for - or perhaps even necessitates - the development of “Emotional Intelligence” as described by Goleman.   Even the seemingly simple act of the child making eye contact with the teacher while shaking hands cultivates something in the children that influences the manner in which they encounter and interact with their fellow human beings.   Perhaps this is why Waldorf school graduates have repeatedly distinguished themselves to college professors, secured prestigious internships, and so on.  

Many years ago, as my first Waldorf class was nearing the completion of eighth grade, I hosted a parent evening specifically to address the decision many families were contemplating:  whether to send their child to the Waldorf high school or not.   Some parents worried about readiness for college.  Some parents voiced concern about continuing to pay tuition rather than saving it for college.  One father whose eldest daughter was going through the college acceptance process spoke up. 

 “I know that we (his family) have been very fortunate to not feel we had to choose between paying for [his daughter’s] high school tuition or being able to send her to college.  But knowing what I know now about how the experience of K-12 Waldorf education has positively shaped my daughter, if I did have to choose I would choose to continue to invest in her Waldorf education.”

He went on to explain that though her grades were on the higher side of average, they were not exceptional compared to some other college applicants, but that she had been accepted into every school she applied to, as well as offered significant scholarship money in many cases.  The feedback that both he and his daughter had received from various college admissions processes was that it was her diversity of skills/experiences, the way she carried and presented herself as a human being, and the manner in which she interacted with college admissions personnel that made her stand out from the sea of applicants.  

Though the work of Gardner, Goleman, and Steiner were independent of one another, it is evident that Steiner/Waldorf Education’s approach to learning and human development hit upon something profound in the realm of education:  educating the whole child.

Submitted by Elisabeth Tarsio, Grade 2 Teacher